The Boston Museum was a proposed
history museum
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these i ...
for the city of
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
,
.
The museum had chosen a nickname, "BoMu", before it was terminated.
Theme
The museum proposed to bring the region's 400-year history into focus, inspiring local residents and visitors from across the globe to explore Boston's rich heritage, historic sites and cultural attractions. A museum and marketplace concept was in development, with additional plans for a low-lying pedestrian bridge to serve as a gateway to the museum and a critical connector of park parcels along the
Rose Kennedy Greenway
The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway is a linear park located in several Downtown Boston neighborhoods. It consists of landscaped gardens, promenades, plazas, fountains, art, and specialty lighting systems that stretch over one mile through Chin ...
. The proposal included five core exhibition galleries, a gallery for national touring exhibitions, an all-purpose theater space, educational spaces, a City Room, a ground-floor marketplace, and a green roof.
Educational mission
The Boston Museum planned to broaden and deepen the appreciation of Boston as a "living classroom" and campus for
thematic learning through partnerships with other historic sites and cultural institutions, sharing best practices and working in concert to create new programming and enrichment activities for educators and students throughout the region. It also hoped to reach out to national audiences through extensive use of electronic links and new media technology.
The Boston Museum planned to be a transformative educational experience for learners of all ages and styles. Its galleries would have used a wide variety of approaches aimed at engaging families, school children and adults at all stages of life. Most importantly, the stories visitors encountered would have had personal resonance, whether of ancestors arriving on Long Wharf or their own physical relationship to the place of Boston.
Location
If designated by the
Massachusetts Turnpike Authority
Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
, the museum would have been built on Parcel 9 in
Downtown Boston
Downtown Boston is the central business district of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. The city of Boston was founded in 1630. The largest of the city's commercial districts, Downtown is the location of many corporate or regional headquarters; ...
, adjacent to the
Rose Kennedy Greenway
The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway is a linear park located in several Downtown Boston neighborhoods. It consists of landscaped gardens, promenades, plazas, fountains, art, and specialty lighting systems that stretch over one mile through Chin ...
,
Faneuil Hall
Faneuil Hall ( or ; previously ) is a marketplace and meeting hall located near the waterfront and today's Government Center, in Boston, Massachusetts. Opened in 1742, it was the site of several speeches by Samuel Adams, James Otis, and others ...
, the
Quincy Market
Quincy Market is a historic building near Faneuil Hall in downtown Boston, Massachusetts. It was constructed between 1824 and 1826 and named in honor of mayor Josiah Quincy, who organized its construction without any tax or debt. The market is ...
, and abutting from the downtown Haymarket. The Boston Museum would have built a pedestrian bridge on Parcel 12, which would have directly connected the Greenway to the museum. In October 2005 the
Massachusetts Turnpike Authority
Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
designated the project as the official developer for Parcel 12.
Structure
The planned building was to have been designed by
Cambridge Seven Associates
Cambridge Seven Associates, Inc. (stylized as CambridgeSeven, and sometimes as C7A) is an American architecture firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Buildings designed by the firm have included academic, museum, exhibit, hospitality, transpo ...
. Since beginning in approximately March 2010, Rose Kennedy Greenway planners believed the Greenway was better suited for natural attractions than for large buildings, Boston Museum planners, including CEO Frank Keefe began looking for another location off the Greenway.
The original planned building was designed by
Moshe Safdie
Moshe Safdie ( he, משה ספדיה; born July 14, 1938) is an architect, urban planner, educator, theorist, and author, with Israeli, Canadian, and American citizenship. He is known for incorporating principles of socially responsible des ...
and Associates and was estimated to cost $124 million.
The proposal included exhibition galleries, theater spaces, a series of education and meeting rooms, a grand hall for large public meetings and a grand concourse. The building would also have featured restaurants and an information center, as well as green space. The Safdie Proposal was superseded by a new plan calling for a different design due to Parcel 12 site conditions. The need to build over two highway ramps would have added such additional cost that the Boston Museum Project sought permission to construct a smaller alternate project on Parcel 9 "The Haymarket". Parcel 12 would then have been used as the site of a sculptural bridge leading pedestrian traffic across to be able to enter the museum or walk on toward North Station.
Core galleries
* Place Over Time would have told the story of the ecological and economic transformation of Massachusetts.
* Conscience and Confrontation would have explored the periodic eruption of political contention ruling Massachusetts, which has often set an agenda for political change across the nation and the globe.
* People of the Bay would have explored the succession of cultures, from native peoples through the latest wave of immigrants, as they created personal, family, community, and inter-group experiences in this region.
* Innovation Odyssey would have focused on the region's many breakthroughs and “firsts” that have had a global reach, spreading liberty and the abolition of slavery, advancing the causes of universal education and expanded health care, igniting both the Industrial Revolution and the Information Age.
* Sports Town was envisioned as an entry point for visitors who might not see themselves as typical museum-goers. They would have been drawn into the gallery - and the museum beyond - because exhibit content would have related to their lifelong passion of sports, which had many "firsts" is Massachusetts.
Termination
In November 2012, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation rejected the Boston Museum's bid to be designated as the developer of Parcel 9, adjacent to the
Rose Kennedy Greenway
The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway is a linear park located in several Downtown Boston neighborhoods. It consists of landscaped gardens, promenades, plazas, fountains, art, and specialty lighting systems that stretch over one mile through Chin ...
, a site created by the
Big Dig
The Central Artery/Tunnel Project (CA/T Project), commonly known as the Big Dig, was a megaproject in Boston that rerouted the Central Artery of Interstate 93 (I-93), the chief highway through the heart of the city, into the 1.5-mile (2.4& ...
highway construction project.
In January 2013, the Board of the Boston Museum voted to terminate its efforts to build a museum and to disband the organization.
People involved
Board of directors
* Louis Miller - Boston Museum Board Chairman; Rackemann, Sawyer & Brewster
*
Roger Berkowitz - President and CEO,
Legal Sea Foods
Legal Sea Foods is an American restaurant chain of casual-dining seafood restaurants mostly located in the Northeastern region of the United States.
The current company headquarters is located in the South Boston Seaport District and as of 202 ...
* Janey Bishoff - Bishoff Communications
* Janice Bourque
*
William M. Bulger
William Michael Bulger (born February 2, 1934) is an American former Democratic politician, lawyer, and educator from South Boston, Massachusetts. His eighteen-year tenure as President of the Massachusetts Senate is the longest in history. He th ...
- President Emeritus, University of Massachusetts
*
Jill Ker Conway - President Emerita, Smith College
* Ralph Cooper - Veterans Benefits Clearinghouse
*
Callie Crossley
Callie Crossley is an American broadcast journalist and radio presenter in the Boston area.
In March 2013 she began hosting a new radio program entitled ''Under the Radar with Callie Crossley'' and continues to contribute to WGBH Radio's "Bosto ...
- WGBH Commentator
* Anne D. Emerson - President Emerita, Boston Museum
* David Feigenbaum - Senior Principal,
Fish & Richardson
Fish & Richardson P.C. is a global patent, intellectual property litigation, and commercial litigation law firm with more than 400 attorneys and technology specialists across the U.S. and Europe. Fish is one of the most sought-after firms for both ...
*
John Fish - CEO,
Suffolk Construction
Suffolk Construction Company stylized as Suffolk is an American construction contracting company based in Boston, Massachusetts with additional locations in California, Florida, New York and Texas. The company is contracted for work in the aviatio ...
*
Ronald Lee Fleming
Ronald Lee Fleming, F.A.I.C.P., is the founder and president of The Townscape Institute, a not-for-profit public interest planning organization founded in the United States in 1979. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners.
...
- Founder, Townscape Institute
*
Richard M. Freeland
Richard Middleton Freeland (born May 13, 1941, in Orange, New Jersey) was president of Northeastern University from 1996 to 2006 and served as the Commissioner of Higher Education for Massachusetts from 2008 until 2015.
Freeland grew up in Mount ...
- Massachusetts Commissioner of Higher Education
* William Galatis - Dunkin' Brands Franchisee
* Perrin M. Grayson, Esq.
* Frank Keefe - CEO, Boston Museum
* Don Law - President, Live Nation - New England
* Alyce J. Lee
*
Tunney Lee
Tunney Lee (, 1931 – July 2, 2020) was an architect, planner, educator, and activist known for his community engagement work primarily in Chinatown, Boston. Lee was a professor emeritus of urban planning and a former head of the Department of ...
- Professor Emeritus, Senior Lecturer, MIT
* Kevin McCall - CEO, Paradigm Properties
* Jane Manopoli Patterson
* James E. Rooney - Massachusetts Convention Center Authority
* William B. Tyler - Chairman Emeritus - Board; Rackemann, Sawyer & Brewster
* James B. White - President Emeritus -Board; Elaw Corporation
* Linda Whitlock - Former Nicholas President & CEO, Boys and Girls Clubs of Boston
* J. David Wimberly - Chairman Emeritus, Frontier Capital Management
National Advisory Committee
* Lou Casagrande - Dean of Education, Social Work, Child Life and Family Studies, Wheelock College
* Spencer R. Crew - Executive Director and CEO, National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
*
Drew Gilpin Faust
Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust (born September 18, 1947) is an American historian and was the 28th president of Harvard University, the first woman to serve in that role. She was Harvard's first president since 1672 without an undergraduate or gradu ...
- President, Harvard University
*
Henry Louis Gates
Henry Louis "Skip" Gates Jr. (born September 16, 1950) is an American literary critic, professor, historian, and filmmaker, who serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the Hutchins Center for African and African Am ...
- Director, W.E.B. DuBois Institute, Harvard University
*
David Gergen
David Richmond Gergen (born May 9, 1942) is an American political commentator and former presidential adviser who served during the administrations of Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton. He is currently a senior political ...
- Director, Center for Public Leadership, Harvard University
*
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Doris Helen Kearns Goodwin (born January 4, 1943) is an American biographer, historian, former sports journalist, and political commentator. She has written biographies of several U.S. presidents, including ''Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream ...
- Historian/ Author
* Marian L. Heard - President and Chief Executive Officer, Oxen Hill Partners
*
Michael Patrick MacDonald
Michael Patrick MacDonald (born March 9, 1966) is an Irish-American activist against crime and violence and author of his memoir, ''All Souls: A Family Story From Southie''. He helped to start Boston's gun-buyback program, and founded the South B ...
- Author/ Activist
*
Thomas H. O'Connor - Professor Emeritus/ University Historian, Boston College
*
Nathaniel Philbrick - Author
*
Robert D. Putnam
Robert David Putnam (born 1941) is an American political scientist specializing in comparative politics. He is the Peter and Isabel Malkin Professor of Public Policy at the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government. Putnam devel ...
- Peter and Isabel Malkin Professor of Public Policy, Harvard University
* Elizabeth Shannon - Writer/ Teacher/ Administrator, Boston University
* Cathy Douglas Stone, Esq.
* Margot Stern Strom - Executive Director, Facing History and Ourselves
*
Andrew Viterbi
Andrew James Viterbi (born Andrea Giacomo Viterbi, March 9, 1935) is an American electrical engineer and businessman who co-founded Qualcomm Inc. and invented the Viterbi algorithm. He is the Presidential Chair Professor of Electrical Engineeri ...
- President, The Viterbi Group
Project consultants
* Richard Rabinowitz, Chief Historian
*
Cambridge Seven Associates
Cambridge Seven Associates, Inc. (stylized as CambridgeSeven, and sometimes as C7A) is an American architecture firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Buildings designed by the firm have included academic, museum, exhibit, hospitality, transpo ...
, Architecture
*
Mikyoung Kim
Mikyoung Kim, FASLA is an American landscape architect, urban designer, and founding principal of Mikyoung Kim Design. Kim has received the Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt Award and the American Society of Landscape Architects National Design Medal. He ...
, Landscsape Architecture
* Boston History and Innovation Collaborative, Content for Innovation Gallery and other galleries
* ConsultEcon, Inc., Economic Feasibility Consultants
References
External links
The Boston Museum website—archived November 13, 2012Cambridge Seven AssociatesBoston Museum seeks new site The Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Boston Museum
City museums in the United States
Defunct museums in Boston
History museums in Massachusetts
Failed museum proposals in the United States